


Japanese Mutant Team

by zephyrprince



Category: Marvel 616, X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men - All Media Types, 帝都物語 - 荒俣宏 | Teito Monogatari - Aramata Hiroshi
Genre: Character(s) of Color, Gen, Japanese Character(s), Original Character(s), Race, female character(s) of color, fic idea, male character(s) of color, story idea
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-20
Updated: 2014-11-20
Packaged: 2018-02-26 09:05:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2646182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zephyrprince/pseuds/zephyrprince
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>In response to the problem of too many good story ideas and nowhere consistent to write them down, I've decided to start scribing them here. I'm sure I'll follow up and flesh out very few of these (although hopefully I will with some) but I'm happy for anyone else to. Just let me know if you do because I'd love to read them.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Japanese Mutant Team

**Author's Note:**

> In response to the problem of too many good story ideas and nowhere consistent to write them down, I've decided to start scribing them here. I'm sure I'll follow up and flesh out very few of these (although hopefully I will with some) but I'm happy for anyone else to. Just let me know if you do because I'd love to read them.

Unlike Cambodia, Japan is a country that does get a lot of play both in the Marvel Comics world and in US media in general. In some ways then it's even weirder that there's never been a unified Japanese mutant/super team. 

The interesting thing that a Japanese state-sponsored team would allow us to explore is the part of the post-World War II US-written Japanese constitution that specifies that the country is not allowed to have their own military. This special team then could skirt that prohibition and address it thematically as well, more generally, the idea of Japan as a former colonizer in Asia as well as a country that underwent a kind of western colonization.

My proposed five character lineup is...

1\. Battle Japan - a zinger straight out the gate. Battle Japan hails from an alternate Marvel earth where the _Super Sentai_ series, _Battle Fever J_ , takes place. Battle Japan is the red ranger of that team and shall return to lead this one. He's the token non-mutant of the team but he has strong weapons proficiency and martial arts abilities.

2\. Armor - obviously the muscle. 

3\. Lady Deathstrike - a melee fighter. I like the idea of there being one character whose nationalism overrides their villainy. I'm also obsessed with the idea of the potential personal interplay between Hisako and Mariko, two very different Japanese women who can agree and disagree about all kinds of things. Ultimately I would like them to develop a kind of adversarial affection for one another - the perfect frenemies.

4\. Sunfire - projectile offense. Design-wise, my favorite version of Sunfire is that from the Age of Apocalypse. I would love to see something that marries that in some way. 

5\. Original female character - the magical girl. As with the angel heroine from my proposed Cambodian team, this is the one hat tip I want to offer to some potentially cliche Japanese tropes. I think that her powers should initially be unexplained and not even well understood by her but seem to center around unnecessarily long sparkly transformation sequences, the use of wands and scepters to cast energy projection, cutesy healing maneuvers, etc. I think ultimately it should be revealed that her powers are based around her own fantasies and when she goes through a period of depression, they change dramatically, perhaps to include things like summoning giant kaiju monsters or mecha. She also should have an adorable talking pet who becomes the team's mascot.

The final character that I think should be brought in eventually as a nemesis (at least primarily) is Katou from _Teito Monogatari_ , the Ainu spirit who wants to take revenge on modern Japan for the destruction they brought on the original inhabitants of the island. I like the idea that after one sort arc that things a lot about Japan's place in the region and the world, there's another that thinks through the internal historical conflicts on the islands.


End file.
